


Bad Day. Bad Night?

by butimnotdeadyet



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Cuddles, F/M, Len isn't dead, Post Season 1, idk why, relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-24
Updated: 2016-06-24
Packaged: 2018-07-17 22:26:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7288522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butimnotdeadyet/pseuds/butimnotdeadyet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leonard tends to shut people out when he is hurting, so Sara waits.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bad Day. Bad Night?

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own LOT

It had been a long day- even by their standards; a day that consisted of bangs and bruises and running into the fray and running for their lives. 

But, now, they were back on the  _ Waverider _ and Sara watched with a cautious eye as he, distinguishable in the dark bedroom only due to the light pouring in from the connected bathroom, quickly exchanged the towel wrapped around his waist for underwear and a dark pair of sleep pants and drew a long-sleeved shirt over stiff and purpling shoulders, head still ducked and turned to face into the light of the room he had left. 

 

They had showered in their separate rooms but, somehow, she, with dried blood to scrap out from underneath her nails and a head full of tangled hair to strip of sweat and gore, had managed to make it back and sit on his bed, fully clothed, before he had so much as reached for the towel. A part of her prickled, wanting to ask him what had taken him so long- not that it was  _ long _ really, still well under the Gideon-imposed cut off of half an hour, but it was a far cry from his typical utilitarian routine of in-and-out in five- but thought better of it. Watching him move in the dim light told her all that she needed to know. He had been trying to close himself off. He had done it before; let himself just stand under the near scalding water after a day like today, like he was trying to revert himself back to a different man- a man who wasn’t bothered by things as human as pain and emotion- but that man wouldn’t, _ couldn’t _ , reappear. Not now, she was sure.

 

Leonard didn’t notice her until he had succeeded in pulling the shirt’s collar into place, past his forehead and nose to rest close against his throat, but once he did, she could she the faint blush on his skin that had accompanied the heat of the shower fade. He turned and took her in with steady eyes, panning from her ankles- crossed, with the left wrapped in an inflammation-reducing bandage she had grabbed out of the medbay when they first returned- to the gray cotton covered legs resting on the mattress, to the mug supported by her left hand, and her damp hair, already drying into the loose waves that they both knew she would spend half any hour in the morning trying to “fix” before threading them into a bun at her back of her head. She saw the recognition flick across his face and knew that she was made, that she had been waiting for him, concerned. He knew, face still and eyes flicking up from where they had been resting on her shoulders to meet her’s before she spoke.

 

“How are you?” 

The question felt wrong as soon as it hit the air. It was almost eerily cool; too collected for who she felt, too thoughtful for pajamas and warm drinks. 

 

“I’m fine,” he replied, half a second too slow by her count, “and you?” He was moving, retrieving his cold gun and goggles from where he had without a doubt dropped them on the desk when making a beeline for the shower, taking the time now that he was clean and marginally less muddled to move each to their proper place on his dresser top only to grip the gun again a moment later and pull a finely-made cloth out of one of the drawers. 

 

“Feel fine- though my arms are gonna kill me in the morning. Who would have thought Palmer was be such a deadweight?” She put herself in check this time, honesty with a touch what she hoped would convey humor.

 

She had never mastered discretion when surveilling in close quarters and on a different night he would have given her grief over the poorly hidden half glance from across the room, observing every move he made while cleaning his weapon. It’s a tell, he had admitted after an evening with a little too much whiskey floating in both of their systems, something he only did when he felt like this, like breaking, something he only did after resolving against restraint. And that’s what he had done- before he knew he would have an audience- and there was no going back now. 

“All of those cupcakes have to go somewhere.”

 

He glance at her when he said it, smirking, always game for a round a snark, but the look dissolved a moment later. His jaw twitched and the lips fell back into a thin line as he examined the gun’s spotless exterior, looking for another distraction. 

Sara nodded, knowing that he would make out the action in his periphery and that he was no longer standing in his bedroom, no longer cleaning his gun- he had returned to the streets. 

 

He was revisiting  _ that _ moment. The moment that his hand had slipped from the grip that had held on for dear life, the moment that they both knew that even if he had magically reclaimed full motion in his arms, he would have lost the little girl covered head-to-toe in street grime. Even if Sara hadn’t let her last knife fly only to have misjudged the release thanks to Ray’s added weight on her shoulders, they still would have heard the girl’s sister scream as soon as Leonard was shoved to the ground and the mercenary in the blood red vest stepped over him to come to a stop in front of the girl. And they all would have still seen the ice-cracking smile under his black hood when a motion barely any more than a flick as his wrist meant he was one small corpse closer to a completed genocide order.

 

What Sara knew he wasn’t remembering was the man resuming his approach and being mere feet away from the older girl when one prolonged burst of blue-white light made the him and his red vest had crumbled to the ground, half of his flesh replaced with peel-like ash. But Leonard had lost one of the girls, probably felt her body fall against his legs after the beast of a man withdrew his hands, and that was all that he could see.   

 

She thought about standing, moving to him, but she knew exactly how well that would bode for both of them. He would shy at her touch and she would curse herself to the Pit and back because she had promised, silently, that he would never be wary of her the way he was of so many others. So, she decided to take the path of least confrontation. 

 

“Len.” She waited until his shoulder ticked in reaction to her tone, gentle and smooth, and a moment longer for his eyes to jump to her face from the gun’s fractured trigger guard. It was all the acknowledgment she would get.

“Do you want me to stay?”

 

He blinked, wide and with a degree of surprise that she could only label as bewilderment. She shifted forward in response, hoping that he would take it as a gesture of good faith, that she would do what he asked if he told her to leave. He turned his back to her again, setting the weapon down before sliding his hands against the dresser’s surface before settling his palms along the corners and curling his fingers around the edge. 

“Why would you want to?”

 

Sara didn’t bother to stop the eye roll that followed, but the quiet brokenness that accented his question ran like a bolt through her chest. He was doing it again- distancing himself from her when he felt vulnerable- another tell, one that he refused to believe held water.  She had realized weeks into their . . .  _ relationship _ that over thirty years of shielding himself from any and all forms of pain, physical and emotional, interpersonal and professional, meant that even when he had invited her in, there were still a dozen schisms between his heart and mind. Between being with him and him allowing himself to be with her.

“Len. . .” she set the mug on the ground beside his bed and rested her hands on her knees, “I would stay because today was a bad day and I’d rather not let tonight be a repeat performance.”

 

He braced himself on the dresser, head hanging, and slowly let out a breathe that Sara had only been half sure he was holding.

“Lay down, stay.”

 

“I can’t think of a reason to stay if you’re going to stand over there all night.” She held out her hand, reaching for one of his own. He turned and crossed the floor between them to accept it, not stopping until he not only had a warm grip on her hand but had looped his free arm around her shoulders and pressed himself flush against her, nose nuzzled into her neck. Sara smiled against his shoulder before pulling back enough to press a kiss beside his ear and lay down, urging him to follow with a tug of their joined hands.

 

He followed with a groan and settled along her side, half of his body curling over her, head returning to her neck and one leg resting between hers. The weight of him, if less carefully distributed along her, would have been smothering, but instead she finally felt grounded, comfortable. The arm he was tucked under moved to run her hand into his close-cropped hair and she naturally lifted her waist long enough for the hand trapped between them to slide beneath her and run along her spine. His breath ran along her skin as they relaxed into each other. She pressed another kiss, this time to his temple, before speaking.

“Could you tell what it was, what happened to your back? Whatever they hit you with looked like it hurt.”

 

“Saw that did you? Thought that you only saw me lose my footing.” The words were muffled, but not enough that she couldn’t hear the teasing lilt. “And, yes, they stung. Best guess is some sort of electrocuting beanbag rounds; mercs must have grabbed ‘em from the riot control that were sent in before Rip dropped us off. Felt like my entire body was on fire, could barely lift my arm enough to fire the gun.” He returned her kiss now, lips briefly pressing to the pulsepoint at her throat while his right hand skimmed along her side after releasing that of hers it had held captive. 

 

Sara reached down to the hem of his shirt, pausing with her finger just under the material. “May I?”

There was a nod and followed by what may have been a muffled ‘ _ of course’,  _ and she pulled the fabric gently back towards her, dodging the perpetually tender spot along his left-hand ribs and balling it against the crest of his right shoulder. Craining her neck she could make out the dark purples from before, but their improved proximity made it possible to decipher the finer details; three white-centered half dollar sized welts in a near perfect line across his upper back, surrounded by swollen and darkening skin. Looking closer, she could just make out the raised spidering stemming from the center of each, seconding his idea of a para-impact shock accompanying the rounds. “You should let me ice them.”

 

He shrugged lightly. “‘M not movin’ again, neither are you.” 

“Is that so, Snart?” She laughed as his tone drifted further away, scratching her nails against his scalp. 

“Mmhmm, don’t wanna rip my stitches.” 

She sucked in a breath and hooked her hand under his forehead, pulling it off of her shoulder to see his face. He smirked and pecked the corner of her mouth, sliding the hand on her side up her arm before leading it to a spot just above the point of his hip, almost brushing her abdomen. Sure enough, her fingertips could make out a fine row of over a dozen sutures. 

“Happened when the bastard knocked me to the ground, couldn’t get my arms under me fast enough and I landed on a piece of siding. Hurt like a sunovabitch, layered right over a bruise I already had. . .” Leonard glanced at her, lifting his head from her hand, “The pain brought me back, pumped me with enough adrenaline to force my arms up again before he could get to the other girl.”

 

Her hand resumed its message against his hairline.

“You did them in the shower. That’s why you took so long.” It wasn’t a question, but Sara felt him nod as he moved to lay beside her more properly, head even with her on his pillow, limbs loosened somewhat from around her until his hands rested on her waist and his knee crossed with hers. 

 

“Figured it was easier than sharing the medbay with the concussed Raymond.” His voice retained its sleep haunted tone.

 

She righted his shirt along his torso. “And you didn’t ask me to do them because. . .?”

 

“Because as much as I enjoy having someone willing to put me back together again, I also have a -what was it you said? Ah- ‘horrible understanding of what it means to be a well adjusted human being in a  _ loving _ relationship’ and I sometimes I forget that  _ you _ are that someone _ no matter when _ I need it, not just when it feels like a good time.” 

 

She froze for an instant at the memory of her slip up from the other day- ‘caring’ would have been the safer choice, but in the moment, with her laying into him about a few of his less reasonable choices, her heart-to-mouth filter was apparently its most permeable. Up until now, she had held out hoped that he had missed her choice of phrasing, similar to how she chose to ignore it now.

“And earlier didn’t feel like a good time?” She asked, raised brow and cynical tone in place. Turning to look him in the eye, she expected a glare in return but was surprised to see a genuine smile starting to form.

 

“Of course not. When is it ever a good time to feel vulnerable, Lance, let alone ask for what amounts to a cuddle from your  _ much _ smaller girlfriend?” His smile widened at Sara indignant scoff as she turned her back to him.

 

“Whatever, next time I’m just going to bust into your bathroom after ten minutes, Asshole.”

 

“No can do, Canary. The shower is the only time I can practice my showtunes.” 

 

Sara had to stop herself from sitting up to take in his expression.

“You  _ do not  _ sing in the sho-”

“Goodnight, Sara.”   

 

She waited to call his bluff, for him to carry on, but it never came. She rolled back over to face him with a gruff ‘ _ whatever, asshole’  _ and curling into his chest and was just about to close her eyes when she heard a faint grumble.  _ ‘Love you, too, Sara.’ _

She laid still, eyes wide, for another moment before a strong arm wrapped around her and pulled her in closer, nimble fingers caressing her back until she drifted.

**Author's Note:**

> You may be wondering why I wrote this. What you don't know is that I am wondering that same thing.  
> I have had it half finished in my drive for weeks so I tried to round it out.
> 
> I actually even have a partial fic about the events that lead to this one, but idk.
> 
> Comments very welcome,  
> Happy Thursday  
> -Dead


End file.
